


I want to be your god

by enmity



Category: Persona 2, Persona Series
Genre: Gen, Innocent Sin
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-09
Updated: 2018-12-09
Packaged: 2019-09-15 03:03:14
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 806
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16925298
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/enmity/pseuds/enmity
Summary: “I never joined you with any intention to be saved. Though I’m sure you know that already.”





	I want to be your god

**Author's Note:**

> set at some ?? vague point in the middle of canon, after the aerospace museum 
> 
> warning for briefly (vaguely) referenced self-harm in the beginning

Joker watched languidly from the chair as she ran the apples under the sink, carved the skin with terse strokes from the dulled edge of a knife glinting in the lazy mid-morning sunlight. They were in Sasaki’s apartment and the meeting had not yet started. On the coffee table there had sat a bowl of fruit with an apology note written in Prince Taurus’ name and Sasaki’s autograph, saying something about a contract or another to oversee, and Anna had taken the liberty as well as the knife from the kitchen drawer, though she could not completely affirm that it was more out of simple hunger than the unconscious pull to simulate an unfortunate accident she had thought of enough times to count as a compulsion. No one could tell for sure.

She cut the fruits into even wedges and slid the clean plate towards the middle of the table, then sat down without taking a slice. Joker, too, was reticent, though the mask was removable -- removed, even, this very moment -- and thus not an issue as she had once thought.

In any case she understood what the mask was for. Looking at the face beneath the veneer brought within her a sort of ache she found hard to describe. He looked too human, she’d decided. A boy not much older than she. Anna supposed that was why she never could stop looking.

“It seems Queen Aquarius will be late,” she said, as the clock on the wall went on ticking. “Shall we wait or begin early?”

“I meant what I said, you know. You could wish for anything you want.” Joker tipped his head slightly to the side and rested his chin on his hand. His eyes narrowed, pretty as the rest of him, though the shine in them remained as obvious as it was familiar, and the sickness she felt upon recognizing it was too. _Don’t give up_ , spoke his gaze in another’s voice from another time. _Everyone’s counting on you!_ “Like your legs back, for instance. You just need to say the word.”

This time it was her turn to remove her mask. She rested it on the space beside her that King Leo would have claimed, had he survived the fall. “Again with your conceit?”

“I could not save King Leo,” he said, with far more solemnity than their former ally deserved. “But for you, there’s still time. Your dream is mine to grant.”

Anna closed her eyes, and for a moment had to try not to smile. “He didn’t deserve your salvation,” she told him, and it was the truth. He was deranged and a murderer and if he deserved anything it was to rot, but instead Joker had come and given him a second chance. The apple broke brittle and sweet between her teeth and she asked, “What makes you think I do?”

“Because I’ve seen you run,” Joker said. “It’s not a sight one easily forgets.”

To that she laughed with neither teeth nor humor. He had seen in her something she no longer possessed and would never be able to regain and all she would ever amount to be-- which was nothing now, no doubt about that. The only respect in which Joker differed was that he was taking longer than most to realize it. Soon enough the light of expectation in his eyes would dim as well. Noriko, too, would come to her own understanding eventually. And then there would truly be nothing left of Anna at all.

“I’m sorry to say that girl no longer exists,” she said at last. “I never joined you with any intention to be saved. Though I’m sure you know that already.”

“Humans are dishonest creatures,” he countered, but went quiet regardless. The seconds passed.

And then his phone rang.

“I think you should take that,” Anna said. “Go on. Use your power on some poor sap who needs it.”

“I suppose I must,” agreed Joker. “This won't take long.”

But as she watched him stand up to leave, pulling on the mask, she didn’t miss the unconvinced look he wore on his face still.

No, that wasn’t the right word. It was the face of a boy who believed, despite all, there was something in her worth salvaging after all.

Alone now, Anna took another slice of the browning apple, and as she brought it to her mouth she thought nothing at all. Not of dreams or expectations or the trace of sweetness dissolving in her mouth, and not of the fact it was not lost on her that only one other person had truly looked through her like that before, with such sincere unwavering faith--

(and certainly not the fact that for it alone, Joker must be an infinitely bigger fool than she could have foreseen)

Nothing at all.

**Author's Note:**

> (i forgot what happened in p2 how does joker know he's been summoned)
> 
> kind of ... rough but i wanted to write about jun and anna ;-; i've just been looking at summaries of the anna novel (thx arianne @/annayoshizaka) and decided to kind of put together my disorganized thoughts? their rs isnt talked abt enough


End file.
